Merkel warns of renewed Balkan conflict if Germany closed borders to refugees

Coalition partners agree a common position after weeks of sniping.

German Chancellor Angela Merkel failed yesterday to fully resolve differences within her ruling coalition over how to deal with the huge refugee influx, leaving open a row that has rocked her government.

Refugees queue on a bridge at the German-Austrian frontier between the Austrian town of Braunau am Inn and the German town of Simbach am Inn, November 1, 2015. But under the plan that Merkel and Seehofer hashed out on Sunday, this “family reunification” initiative will be frozen until 2017. Merkel strongly opposed the idea. All three parties have lost support in opinion polls over their handling of the crisis.

“We could set up the transit zones in a way that makes them effective without conveying detention”, he told German radio, giving no details about what a compromise would look like. She continues to stand by her decision to temporarily open the borders in September.

Merkel and Seehofer stayed on and aligned their positions but must now get the SPD on board.

The risk seems manageable.

SPD leader and Vice Chancellor Sigmar Gabriel is a staunch opponent of the CSU’s transit zone proposal.

Mrs Merkel said it was Germany’s responsibility as the EU’s largest member to find a united European solution to the refugee crisis.

The reprieve for Merkel could be temporary.

BDI President Ulrich Grillo, whose ancestors moved to Germany from Italy in the 17th century, called on the government to do more to assuage public concern over the arrival of as many as 10,000 people per day into Germany.

The bodies of two men, one woman and a young boy were found early Sunday washed up on beaches in the Skala area of northern Lesbos – the stretch that has seen the heaviest traffic of asylum-seekers trying to get into Europe from Turkey.

The document did not broach the thorny issue of the “transit zones”, which the SPD has rejected as too restrictive. But he appears to have drawn the line at the creation of transit zones, which he has termed “detention centers”. The Chancellor’s hold on power in Germany has relied throughout her decade in office on her ability to co-opt and balance the positions of both the left and the right, thus allowing her to dominate the political landscape as a pragmatic centrist for all occasions.

According to the FAZ, Merkel described the refugee situation in “harsh words”.